LXXXVII. Climate The town of Honda, although situated at the height of BOOK 900 feet above the level of the sea, experiences, in consequence of the reflection from the rocks, so intense a degree of heat, that the people dare not place their hand upon and tempestones exposed to it; and the water of the river Magdale- ratures. na acquires the temperature of a hot bath. The rains fall without intermission during winter, which is determined, by the position of the place, to the north or south of the equator; but some spots enjoy a perpetual spring. The crest of the Andes is often enveloped in thick fogs; and the bay of Choco is the scene of continual storms. The two rivers Magdalena and Cauca, both of which run straight Rivers from south to north, have their rise and opening in New Grenada, and both of them run at the bottom of one of the deep valleys of the Andes, and form a junction under the 9th degree of north latitude. The course of the Cauca is obstructed by rocks and rapids; but the Indians are able to pass them in their canoes. The Magdalena is navigable as far as Honda; from which you proceed to Santa Fe, by terrific roads, through forests of oak trees, Melastomes and Cinchonas. The Tempera unvarying nature of the temperature in each zone, ture. the want of an agreeable succession of seasons, perhaps also the awful volcanic catastrophes to which the high country is frequently exposed, have diminished the number of the human species. At Quito and at Santa Fe, vegctation is less varied than in other regions equally elevated above the ocean. In the Andes of Quindiu, and in the temperate forests of Loxa, the cypress, the fir, and the juniper-bush, raise their snowy pyramids in the midst of the Styrax, the passion-flower-tree, bambusas, and the wax palm tree. The cocoa of Guayquil is in great estimation : it has even been attempted, in the environs of this town, to introduce plantations of coffee, which have succeeded extremely well. Their cotton and tobacco are excellent. A great deal of sugar is likewise produced: it is surprising, however, that the greatest quantity is obtained, not on the plains along the banks of the river Magdalena, BOOK but, on the slope of the Cordilleras, in a valley, on the LXXXVII. road from Santa Fe to Honda, which, according to the Mineral produc tions. barometrical measurements of M. de Humboldt, is elevated from 3600 to 6300 feet above the level of the sea. The inhabitants make use of the expressed juice of the fruit of the uvilla, (Cestrum tinctorium,) instead of ink; and there is a royal order, which enjoins the viceroys to make use of this blue juice of the uvilla in their official documents, because it is more indestructible than the best ink of Europe. The mineral productions are rich and varied in the valley of Bogota; beds of coal are seen at the elevated height of 7680 feet above the level of the ocean. It is very Platinum. remarkable, that platinum is not met with in the valley of Cauca, or to the east of the western branch of the Andes, but only in Choco, and at Barbacoas, to the west of the mountains of sandstone, which rise on the west bank of the Cauca. Gold. The kingdom of New Grenada annually produces twentytwo thousand pounds weight of gold, and an inconsiderable quantity of silver. In the mints of Santa Fe and Popayan, about two million one hundred thousand piastres of gold are coined, or eighteen thousand three hundred merks, equivalent to £436,666 Sterling. The exportation of this metal in ingots and articles of jewellery, amounts to four hundred thousand piastres, or £104,166 Sterling. Grenada is the product They are also acquaintmountains of Guamoer All the gold furnished by New of the washings of alluvial earth.* ed with veins of gold in the and Antioquia; but the working of them is almost entirely neglected. The greatest riches in washed gold are deposited to the west of the central Cordillera, in the provinces of Antioquia, and Choco, in the valley of Rio Cauca, and on the shores of the great ocean, in the district of Barba coas. Terrain du Transport, Daubisson. Choco. The province of Antioquia, which can only be penetrated BOOK on foot, or by being carried on men's backs, contains veins LXXXVII, of gold, which are not worked, merely from want of hands. The largest piece of gold that has been found at Choco Gold weighed twenty-five pounds. All the gold is collected by washing of negro slaves. Choco alone would be able to produce more than twenty thousand pounds weight of washed gold, if, in attempting to improve the salubrity of this region, one of the most fertile of the new continent, the Government were to establish an agricultural population there. The country richest in gold is, at the same time, scourged with continual famine. Inhabited by unhappy African slaves, or by Indians who groan under the despotism of Corregidors, Choco has remained precisely what it is at present, for the last three hundred years, an impenetrable forest, without a single trace of cultivation, pasturage, or roads. The price of commodities is so exorbitantly high there, that a barrel of flour from the United States is worth from sixty-four to ninety piastres, or £13, 6s. to £18, 15s. The maintenance of a Muleteer costs a piastre, (4s. 2d.) or a piastre and a half a day. The price of a quintal of iron amounts, during the time of peace, to forty piastres. This high price ought not to be attributed to the accumulation of the representative signs, which is very small; but to the enormous difficulty of conveyance, and to that unfortunate condition of things, in which the entire population consumes without accumulating. The kingdom of New Grenada contains extremely rich veins of silver. Those of Marquetones would surpass Potosi, but they are not worked.* Copper and lead they disdain to mention. The river of emeralds flows from the Andes to the north of Quito. It is at Muzo, in the valley of Tunca, that the principal modern mines, of what are called the emeralds of Peru, are situated, which are deservedly preferred to all others, since those of Egypt have been neglected. These emeralds are sometimes met with * Viajero Universal, vol. XXII. p. 277. BOOK in sterile veins, which traverse compound rocks, or clay LXXXVII. slate, and sometimes the accidental cavities which occur in Towns of Bogota. the masses of some granites. Occasionally they are grouped with crystals of quartz, feld-spar, and mica; many of them have their surface covered with crystals of the sulphuret of iron, and others are found enveloped in carbonate or sulphate of lime.* Those that are found in the Indian sepulchres are shaped into spheres, cylinders, cones, and other figures, and have been pierced with great precision; but we are unacquainted with the process which must have been employed for this purpose. The gold mines of Antioquia and Guaimoco contain small diamonds. They likewise possess sulphuretted mercury, or cinnabar, in the province of Antioquia, to the east of the Cauca, in the mountain of Quindiu, at the passage of the western Cordillera ; and, lastly, at Cuença, in the kingdom of Quito. This mercury is found in a formation of quartzose sandstone, which is 720 feet in thickness, and contains fossil wood and asphaltum. We now proceed to the more remarkable places of this and plain kingdom. Santa Fe de Bogota, the residence of a viceroy and an archbishop, and the seat of an Audiencia and a University, contains churches, magnificent houses, five superb bridges, and thirty thousand inhabitants. The air is constantly temperate. The wheat of Europe, and the sesame of Asia, produce abundant crops, and at all seasons. The plateau on which the town of Santa Fe de Bogota is situated, bears a resemblance, in several respects, to that which incloses the Mexican lakes. Both one and the other are more elevated than the convent of Saint Bernard; the former being 8190, the latter 7008 feet above the level of the sca. The valley of Mexico, surrounded with a circular wall of porphyritic mountains, is still covered with water in its centre. The plateau of Bogota is equally encircled by lofty mountains; while the perfect level of + Dolomieu, Magasin EncycloViajero Universal, ibid, 1. c. * Viajero Universal, vol. XXII. p. 277. pédique, II. n. 6. p. 149. dama., its surface, its geological constitution, the form of the BOOK rocks of Suba and Facatativa, which rise like little islands LXXXVII. in the midst of the Savannahs, all appear to indicate the existence of an ancient lake. The river Funzha, commonly called Rio de Bogota, after uniting together the waters of the valley, rushes headlong through a narrow opening in a crevice, which descends towards the basin of the river Magdalena. The Indians attribute to Bochica, the founder of the empire of Bogota, or Condinamarca, this opening in the rocks, and the creation of the cataract of Tequen- Cataract dama. Contemplating these rocks, which appear to have of Tequenbeen hewn by the hand of man, the narrow gulf, into which a river precipitates itself, after it has collected all the waters of the valley of Bogota-the rainbows, that change their appearance every instant, and glitter with the most brilliant colours-the immense column of vapour, which, like a thick cloud, rises to such a height, as to be distinguished at the distance of five leagues round the environs of the town of Santa Fe-it is not at all astonishing that a superstitious people should have ascribed to them a miraculous origin. There scarcely exists in the world another cascade which, to so considerable a height, adds so great a body of water; to within a short distance of the Salto, the Rio de Bogota preserves a breadth of two hundred and seventy feet. The river becomes a great deal narrower near the cascade itself, where the crevice, which appears to have been formed by an earthquake, has an opening of only thirty or forty feet. During the driest part of the season, the volume of water, which at two bounds rushes down a depth of five hundred and thirty feet, still presents a surface of 756 square feet. The enormous mass of vapour which every day arises from the cascade, and is again precipitated by the contact of the cold air, greatly contributes to the exceeding fertility of this part of the plain of Bogota. At a short distance from Canoas, on the height of Chipa, a magnificent prospect is enjoyed, which astonishes the traveller by the striking contrasts it presents. After just leaving behind him cul |